Pope wants to re-word the Lord's Prayer??

https://www.express.co.uk/news/worl...-God-Catholic-scripture-religion-christianity

This one's got me scratching my head...

 

The page isn't loading for me. Can you give an overview?

 

From the article:
"POPE Francis has called for the Lord’s prayer to be changed – arguing that the translation used by many parts of the world goes against the teachings of the Bible."

According to the article, Pope Francis thinks "...lead us not into temptation" is unscriptural in that it implies that God induces us to sin.

He wants it to be re-translated to read "do not let us fall into sin" or something similar. This is of course because the wording Lord's Prayer is the most pressing issue that Vatican needs to battle right now.

 

Does the article cite any sources? Because far too often, the "sources" are "anonymous Vatican officials" or the like. He is also taken out of context a lot (probably because he never does anything to try and rectify it when it happens).

If this is true, I see the point he is trying to make, and disagree that the translation needs to be altered. People simply need to be taught what the phrase means.

 

Let me know what your research digs up. I'm not very invested in the Pope's opinions either way....just a strange headline in the news feed.

 

Makes sense to me. He isn't wrong. It is explicitly anti-Scriptural that God would lead us into temptation, and the Lord's Prayer, being the most prayed thing we have, gives off that impression on face value very often. We should retranslate it to fit closer to the real meaning, for as wonderful as Tyndale was and is in heaven, he is not the end-all-be-all of translation.

 

Please do explain how scripture can be unscriptural?

Brothers, don't you understand? These are the very words of the Word made Flesh. These are the very words He taught us to pray. What hubris is this that we think we can improve upon Christ?!

What is clear is how poor the current state of catechesis is, not only in the Roman church but in ours as well.

Here is the "offending" passage:
St. Matthew 6:13
καὶμὴεἰσενέγκῃςἡμᾶςεἰςπειρασμὸν,ἀλλὰῥῦσαιἡμᾶςἀπὸτοῦπονηροῦὅτισοῦἐστινἡβασιλεία,καὶἡδύναμις,καὶἡδόξα,εἰςτοῦςαἰῶναςἀμήν
or
"And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen."

εἰσφέρω - eispherō - means to lead or bring into
ἡμᾶς - hēmas - means us, our we
μή - mē - expresses absolute negation and is used elsewhere to say God forbid, never, not
εἰς - eis - into or to
πειρασμός - peirasmos - expresses experience, proof, provocation and is translated as temptation(s) at least 20 times in scripture.

You may not agree with it, but that's how Our Lord put it. So that settles it. Whatever some may say, Our Lord clearly communicates to us that God doesn't just let. He leads...and leads not. Scripture says, "man's heart deviseth his way: but the LORD directeth his steps."
God is not passive. He directs us. He leads us. He prevents us from going. To say anything else would be as unscriptural as saying God tempts us, which the Lord's Prayer doesn't do by the way. In fact it says just the opposite.

Before calling for a revision on the Grandaddy of all Christian liturgical prayers, drafted by Christ himself, a wiser, more humble person would recognize the possibility that it's not scripture, but his interpretation of it, that's wrong.

 

The English Language Liturgical Consultation addressed this issue in 1988, and so for nearly thirty years the Anglican Church of Australia (in the main) has been praying 'save us from the time of trial'. I am not sure who else uses the ELLC texts in their liturgies, but I do not imagine that we are on our own. The document from ELLC that set out the texts also explains much of the process and the arguments that lead the the revisions. There was a bit of a discussion when the texts were introduced, and the matter was discussed, probably in most congregations, and in the end we have simply adopted the change and moved on.

9 Save us from the time of trial
10 and deliver us from evil.​

Line 9. “Save us from the time of trial.” Two errors must be avoided in this line. The first is the misconception that God would “tempt” or entice people to evil, and the second is to think that the original Greek word peirasmos means “temptation” as it is meant today. The reference here is primarily eschatological—a petition for deliverance from the final “time of trial” which, in biblical thought, marks the last days and the full revelation of the anti-Christ. The peril envisaged is that of apostasy—the renunciation of the Christian faith in the time of suffering and persecution which is expected to herald the final triumph of God’s kingdom (Luke 22:31, 32, 40: Revelation 3:10). Yet a reference to any occasion of testing, including the lure to sin, is not excluded. Commenting on this line, Luther speaks of “despair, unbelief, and other great and shameful sins,” which is his way of saying that ultimately all sin is a failure of faith. The Consultation considered whether to restore the negative of the original by writing a more literal version of the Greek—“Do not bring us to a time of trial.” The practical problem of making a change at this stage, however, when many Churches have overcome the difficulty of adopting the ICET version, was too great to be countenanced. In the end, the Consultation was persuaded that the preposition “from” sufficiently conveyed the negative sense (compare “Do not let the children starve” and “Save the children from starving”), while avoiding the misleading inferences mentioned above. Attention was also given to a request that “from” be changed to “in.” Apart from weakening the negative force of the original, it was considered that “in” conveyed only one of the two principal meanings of the line, that is, either a request to be spared from coming to the time of trial or a request to be spared, when one is in a time of trial, from its effects, especially from apostasy.

Line 10. “and deliver us from evil.” While a strong case can be made for the translation “deliver us from the Evil One,” or “deliver us from Evil,” the Greek text does not demand either. It seemed wise to preserve the familiar rendering. That this line begins with “and” rather than “but” is a consequence of the rendering of line 9.​

http://englishtexts.org/Portals/11/Assets/praying.pdf​

The rendition of the text is not without merit. The NRSV renders it.

Matthew 6:13
And do not bring us to the time of trial, but rescue us from the evil one.​

So, in short the proposition is not new, and it is not simply a papal innovation. I also do not think it is a sheep station, but for those who are interested in these things Praying Together linked above is a relatively easy read and in total only 45 pages, and generally puts a case on the merits of the texts that they have provided.

 

You're absolutely right, and a good number of faithful Roman and Eastern Catholics will agree with you. Pope Francis seems to, or, appears to carry that hubris of which you first speak (have you read some of his teaching?). I have studied a little bit of Greek, but the translation from the original is indeed as you point out.

It was good for the translations of the Douai-Rheims, the KJV, even the Tyndale and even the Wycliffe Middle-English translation.

 

You are quite right brother. An example of this Pope chipping away at orthodoxy

 

My contention was that it may not necessarily be translated properly. Christ does not contradict the Scriptures, but translations can. God is not a tempter, and he does not tempt us. This is what the Scriptures teach. Unless, of course, we wish to pit James against the rest of Scripture once again.

 

For instance, Strong's Concordance has it as "trial" first and foremost. This makes much more sense than "temptation," and I'd daresay that when those older translations Cameron brought up were made, the distinction wasn't as wide as it is in today's English. If we want to keep a hieratic English, perhaps we can say "lead us not into tribulation?"

 

It appears to be his charism.

 

I found a bit more on it (and a page I can access). I guess he has difficulty with the way it's worded in Italian (though I understand that it comes out more or less the same in English). He doesn't like how it suggests (in a modern understanding) that God would lead us to sin. I'm not sure how much of this is in the linked article, since I still can't access it.

I personally don't find the prayer problematic- of course, that's mostly because I'm aware of what the verse in question more accurately means. In light of what else we know about God, it's clear that God wouldn't tempt us- rather, He would allow us to be tempted. God has an "active will" (what He desires) and a "passive will" (what He allows aside from His active will). I suppose this verse should be taken not as, "Please don't tempt us", but rather, "Please don't allow us to be tempted." The "tempter" is either the devil, the world, or the flesh, so I imagine we can also understand this as, "Please give us the grace to resist temptation."

I don't know what all motivated the Pope to speak out, and while I disagree, I hardly consider his thoughts "unorthodox". At least one of his motivations seems to be to proactively resolve an issue a layman may encounter. Of course, I think giving all parishioners some additional instruction in the faith would be more effective, it's not as feasible.

 

This is precisely my thinking. Better catechesis also treats the problem, but when there is no problem in the original language, only our translation of it, and that translation can easily be fixed to better compliment modern language and understanding, then there is nothing wrong with changing our translations.

 

The way I understand it:

Isn't it talking about the possibility of God giving us over to depraved desires or hardening us after rejecting his call? I am not a Calvinist, as I do not believe that God actually causes evil directly but rather allows it to unfold in the world on its own course. But the Bible does seem to suggest this, since it talks about God giving people over to reprobate minds. This, as I said, is the result of resisting his call to repentance and Godly living. Simply put, it is a plea for God to save us from falling into his judgement from our rebellion. Of course, it also doesn't imply outright damnation either, but periods of rebellion that grieve the Holy Spirit before we, who have been saved, come back into communion with him and are restored.

 

The way I see it (as someone considerably undecided between Arminianism and Infralapsarian Calvinism; perhaps we should have another thread on that ) is basically that God does lead people into trials. God, for instance, brought suffering on Job. But he is not the one who tempts people to sin.

 

Article XXIV
Of speaking in the Congregation in such a tongue as the people understandeth
It is a thing plainly repugnant to the Word of God, and the custom of the Primitive Church, to have publick Prayer in the Church, or to minister the Sacraments in a tongue not understanded of the people.​

Some of the challenge that we are presented with is the words of the Tudor and Elizabethan Prayer Books, and the principles of those very same Prayer Books as enunciated in Article 24. I am not heavily invested in the debate, partly no doubt because I have become accustomed to the rendering of the Lord's Prayer used by my Church (the ELLC text), which seems to correspond to the scholarship of the NRSV.

 

@Philip, it seems to me that you are mixing categories here, as different translations are all speaking in the common tongue of the people, neither circumstance triggers Article XXIV?

 

Matthew 6:13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.'

Jesus knows that his Father allowed us to have free-will, meaning, that the Father will more than likely allows us to be tempted. Actually, anytime we are running on self-will we are prone to temptation. However, we have the choice, from moment to moment, to relinquish our free-will for God's-will. Jesus is telling us to ask the Father to intervene with our free-will so as not to be lead to temptation. But to lead us away from temptation, hence..."but deliver us from the evil one."